


Sihlenta’s Curse

by GothMoth



Series: Ectobers Ectoplasmic Splatters [46]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Angst, Backstory, Character Death, Chronic Illness, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Angst, Family Dynamics, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Illnesses, OC Focused, Prequel, Traditions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:54:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27291520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GothMoth/pseuds/GothMoth
Summary: Prequel toOne Of The Herb, highly recommend reading that first.What was the life Sihlenta left to seek out a town where both the living and the dead practically coexisted? And better yet, why?
Series: Ectobers Ectoplasmic Splatters [46]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1511411
Comments: 2
Kudos: 43





	Sihlenta’s Curse

**Author's Note:**

> Ectober Week 2020 Cloak/Plague

A young girl sits at the side of a bed, her feet up on the seat of her chair and a bundle of strange herbs giving off a visible aroma cradled between her legs and stomach. Her faintly green-tinted lips are turned down in a frown as her purple/green streaked eyes watch the lady on the bed with both sadness and understanding. The lady on the bed breathes slow and deep, barely conscious and with her head tilted towards the girl and her herbs; breathing in the aromas. Her once fierce orange hair that sticks out from under her bird mask is now an ashy brown with only hints of its former colour; it makes her look so very old even though she is only thirty-two years of age. 

The young girl’s hair is tipping brown as well. They both know that is not a good sign, but neither calls any attention to it. The older because she lacks the strength to have That Conversation again. The younger because she knows what she has to do and she doesn’t want to do it. Not now. Not ever even. She shouldn’t have to. The land was strong. The herbs grew well. The dead visited often. But there were facts both knew, that the current situation was proof of. 

It wasn’t enough. 

The Deaths Aura given off by the spirits, muses and banshees that came to enjoy the smells and flavours of their grown herbs, was simply too weak and they didn’t come often enough. Not for her family. Not for mother. Not for Oma. Not for _her_. She was young but it wasn’t truly enough. 

Both women turn their heads when the beads covering the doorway make soft clinks and chimes as they’re pushed aside. An older woman walking in quietly on bare feet. She was in her late forties but any would think she was nearer to seventy due to the gray-streaked orange hair and worn skin. She had the hands and feet of someone who spent their time tending to plants and preparing herbs entirely by hand. Though her cloak and bird mask disguise her age and gender. She approaches the bedside, grabbing up the lady’s wrist and dangling a small berry over top. Her sad smile pulling at aged skin can be felt even if it can’t be seen, “my apologies my sweet one, it would seem your skin is no longer receptive. There is little any, living or dead, can do now”. 

“I suspected as much. It is what it is”. 

Both adults turn to the young girl. The bedridden women speaking softly yet almost chastising, “ _Sihlenta_ ”. 

The girl puts her chin on her knees, “I know”. She knows that traditionally she’s not old enough. That she hasn’t learned how to plant Spleemi the right way yet. Or how to mix Deaths Nip in a way the dead found the most pleasing. But her mother wanted to be around, wanted to watch and support her. Support her on the day that would be the last that anyone would see her bare face. When she got her mask and cloak, that all those of her heritage wore. She can’t remember what her mother's face looked like, and she’d never seen her Oma’s. 

Looking to her Oma, she’s not surprised to see her holding up a folded cloak. She knows not doing this would only hurt her mother, her mother that likely didn’t even have an hour of life left in her. So she nods softly, putting the bundle of herbs onto the wicker table next to her mother's bed and the place she’ll probably die. Standing and looking up to her Oma, “I... know I’m not truly ready or that I even really want to but”, she fiddles with the browning tips of her hair, “it’s what must be. The way we are”. 

The older woman nods softly herself, “Letomanes is an unkind fate, my little one. I am walking proof we can live a life, but it is hardly one lived gently or free of suffering”. The young girl nods back and lowers her head, she could already feel the ache beginning in her joints; aches that she knows will spread through her bones over time. That breathing will one day make her ribs ache. That her teeth will burn and ache at any food with even the slightest of a rough texture. That she won’t be able to sleep comfortably as her spine, arms, and ribs will scream over the pressure. 

The older woman does not need to see the youngers face to see her sadness. So often did people forget their bodies showed their insides as much as their faces did. Unfolding the cloak and draping around the young girl’s shoulders, “sih~anne~tïïa, though young and still blooming, here you are home and millions of flower petals fall covering your footprints before you. However, your time of youth is at its end, changing with the season's sway. To change and not fade away. To make sure that you shall not be lost. For you we welcome with rain-soaked cloth”, buttoning the cloak closed. 

The young girl looks up and makes herself smile faintly, turning to her mother as her Oma passes a birds mask to her and helps her to sit up. The mother cups her cheeks and rubs her thumbs across those cheeks, “shëa~lent, keep your dew-berry eyes and unripened apple lips. I am the shadow behind you offering you this helping hand, though bless you not be the next maiden in row. My flower may be dead, but I’ll scatter my petals down your road to hope it never ends. I’ll love you and I hope you’ll understand. Oh sweet as honey, your garden will grow even if there is where I’ll never go. Answer with laughter and may ye be free under birds wing”. 

“I don’t want you to go”.

“I know, and for that I apologise”, she slips the birds mask over the younger girl’s face, clasping it around the back of her head. Both mother and Oma grabbing one side of the cloak's hood to pull it up, covering the young girl’s fox orange hair. 

Not half an hour later Oma and daughter watch as the woman’s ribs rattle and her eyes leak green. Both moving to help her lay back down, the younger moving clumsily under the heavy cloak. All three feel comforted and eased slightly as a young beautiful muse floats in dancing on the air. Humming softly and moving to grab the bedridden woman’s hands. The eldest laughs lightly, “it would seem the muses have claimed you. You are to be a muse, my dear Remiana”. None of the women pay any mind to the aromas of the herbs in their masks beaks reacting to the presence of one of the dead. 

“I think I’m quite fine with that”. 

The muse hums and giggles, sounding like small bells on the wind. Moving her face into the face/mask of the young girl, “I’m here, don’t you fear. Little one. But rumours on the wind I bring, they sing of a mortal town to become of two worlds. Life and death with hands enjoined. Brave it will you?”, and tilts her head. 

The eldest laughs slightly, “ah”, looking to the youngest, “any trip is far beyond what I can take. But you, _our_ little one, that is a path you could take”. 

The muse hums yet again, crossing her legs and moving to cradle the bedridden woman’s head in her lap, “Amity Park we hear it called, though not yet a place that dead love, things will change in time we hear”. 

The young girl frowns a little but says nothing, everyone looking to the bed at rattled wheezing. Both women grabbing Remiana’s hands as she shudders. The muse humming and patting at her hair. Her breathing in shakily, “I valued, nothing more, more than, you two”. Both women pat her hands, doing their best to ignore the choking sounds. 

* * *

A young girl sits in a garden of flowers, cloak bunched up and a bird mask reminiscent of a plague doctors with setting sunlight highlighting its angles. A much older woman walking barefoot up behind her, wind blowing her cloak in the air faintly, “so, what are you going to do, little mystic who weaves”. 

The young girl looks up at the sky, watching the light gray clouds moving across it, both women ignoring the scent of death wafting off the house behind them. She plucks off a small white bell-shaped flower absently, a Grave Seer, before standing. “I will find it, this land of life and death, and maybe then...”, turning her head to look back to the elder woman, “maybe then I’ll be free”. 

The elder woman nods, walking up and handing her a pouch. Putting a hand on the younger girl’s masks beak, “then may these keep you well, and may we meet again under the cherry trees after a time long from now. Practice plenty and do not turn your nose up at any bonds you may find”. 

The young girl nods, hugging her Oma before turning away and taking off running. She knows her time will be short, but she’s got a town to find. A place ripe with the dead that will chase away her aches and pains. To save her from the fate of her heritage. Even if to here she’ll likely never return, you can’t return to the past. So she’ll move on with life and live, and then... then she’ll never hesitate again. Gently she hopes that if the answer she’s looking for exists where she wanders then the world will let her see it bloom. Not knowing yet the years it will take to arrive nor the young half-dead boy she’ll find in a town that straddles the line of life and death just as much as one muse, and many others she’ll meet along the way, said it did. 

**End.**


End file.
